Vagabonding as a Spiritual Path

The natural world is my muse and sanctuary -- a place for refuge and discovery. My most memorable moments have been in the outdoors. I have hiked thousands of miles of trails through forests, deserts and mountains. Having spent much of my life traveling and trekking, I still crave adventure and new experiences. Vagabonding or nomadic wandering is a unique way of living, a spiritual path to authenticity, self-awareness and solitude. Solitude allows time for self-examination, relaxation away from urban stress, and a chance to meditate, contemplate, or just zone out for hours at a time. Many of my most memorable experiences took place during solo journeys into Nature. The longer the solo immersion, the more transformational the experience.

In October 2011, I felt Spirit calling me. I felt compelled to travel to the sacred sites and power places that beckoned me. I followed my intuition and deepest instincts. I traveled with my drum and medicine bundle to shamanize the meridian system of Mother Earth's numinous web, which is the planetary counterpart to the acupuncture meridian system of the human body. At the intersection points of the planet's energy web exist holy places, power spots, or acupuncture points. Like acupuncture needles, humans are capable of maintaining the harmonious flow of the planetary energy meridians by making an Earth connection at power places.

Many magical things happened during my two month pilgrimage. I camped at Panther Meadows on Mount Shasta. I hiked among the oldest living things on the Earth in the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest. I soaked in the healing waters of Umpqua, Buckeye, Travertine, Whitmore, and Keough Hot Springs. Indigenous people worldwide believe that where fire and water mix at a hot spring is a sacred place. A water deity, usually a goddess, resides in each spring. People make pilgrimages to thermal springs to connect with the goddess and to supplicate the benefits of her healing graces. The sacred ambience of the place, its geothermal energy and the pilgrim's relationship to it, is sufficient to fulfill the pilgrim's aspirations.

I ventured south through California and explored the Owens Valley area on the east side of the Sierra Nevada crest. Before returning home in early December, I planned a four day desert exploration. On day one, I visited the Sleeping Lizard, which is an ancient vision quest site located in the Volcanic Tablelands north of Bishop. This site is sacred to the Owens Valley Paiute people, who use alcoves in the rock for vision quests. I took a journey back in time to visit the ancient ones who etched petroglyphs in the volcanic rock.

Next, I drove up the Whitney Portal Road towards the trailhead that hikers climb up to Mount Whitney. Unfortunately the road to the trailhead was closed for the winter. I backtracked down the road and camped in the Alabama Hills, located in the shadow of Mount Whitney just west of Lone Pine. The rounded weathered contours of the reddish-orange foothills contrast with the sharp ridges of the Sierra Nevada to the west. Throughout the last century, the Alabama Hills have appeared in hundreds of films and commercials. During my visit, a Quintin Tarantino project (Django Unchained) was being shot there.

In one day I drove from Mount Whitney (the sacred masculine), the tallest mountain in the continuous 48 states, into Death Valley (the sacred feminine), the lowest elevation in North America. Shortly after entering Death Valley National Park, I took an eight-mile detour north along the Saline Valley Road to visit a Joshua Tree forest at Lee Flat. The Saline Valley Road is very rough and progress was slow, but I eventually reached the magical forest. A cold wind buffeted me each time I left the confines of my truck to hike and photograph the forest. I would have camped here for the night if not for the high elevation and bitter cold wind. I camped instead at Panamint Springs Resort, 22 miles inside the western border of Death Valley National Park.

The following day, I explored Darwin Falls and the remote Panamint Valley adjacent to Death Valley. I camped for the next few days at the far northeast end of the South Panamint Dry Lake, a small wetland, grassland, dune system and mesquite bosque. The warm sulfur springs of this desert oasis provide habitat for frogs, shore birds, marsh hawks, and wild burros. A short-eared owl visited my campsite each evening at dusk. The stars bathed the cold desert in a warm glow. Few things are more serene than the deep stillness of the desert on a starry night. In that stillness, I am reborn, forever changed.

Oh, how I love vagabonding. Shamanism is deeply rooted in Nature and a nomadic lifestyle. The emphasis is on the individual, of breaking free and discovering one's own uniqueness in order to bring something new back to the group. Like drumming, nomadic wandering alters your ordinary everyday awareness. It is another means of habitual pattern disruption for reimprinting on alternate realties. When you leave home, meet new people, experience new stimuli, and process new information, you're soon intoxicated on a natural high. As Ed Buryn, the godfather of modern vagabonding puts it, "Vagabonding is nothing less than reality transformation, and its power is not to be underestimated."